Team Skull's Redemption Road Trip!
by Mandriel
Summary: Setting himself straight was never going to be easy. But Guzma never expected to be sent on a quest across the region; saddled with his self-proclaimed big sister, a cursed ex-grunt and a man claiming to be a Pokemon. What could possibly go wrong? Conflict nobody asked for, an enemy from the past, fairies... Who's idea was this, anyway?
1. Ancient Stuff that Actually Works

**AN: So this idea has been in my head for quite a while and I figured 'screw it, might as well start sometime!' despite the fact that I have enough work to begin with. Expect a lot of hiatuses as this is my last year of school and I have four major works to finish by the end of the year.**

 **Ha ha… Why do I do this to myself…**

 **So here you have** _ **Team Skull's Redemption Road Trip!**_ **, a story that I have no idea where it came from and the barest idea of where it's going to go!**

* * *

 _Ancient Things that Actually Work_

Sometimes, when you hear something particularly ridiculous sounding, it takes a few moments to fully comprehend what had been said. This leaves you looking like an idiot as you try to work out if the speaker was actually serious when they said what they did.

Guzma was experiencing firsthand exactly what that felt like.

"A redemption ritual." He echoed dumbly. Really, he shouldn't have expected anything else from Kahuna Hala. Did he really think the old loon could help him at all? Time away from his old master really made him forget what he could be like.

Hala seemed to brighten at Guzma's disbelief, "Yes, a redemption ritual." He confirmed with a nod and Guzma felt his heart sink a little at the realisation that he was completely serious about his suggestion, "Legend says that it was invented by the founders of Melemele Island themselves and passed down through the ages by word of mouth."

"Just because something's old, doesn't mean it works, old man." Guzma responded without a trace of amusement, "Didn't people think drinking mercury made you immortal? That shit kills you. Kinda makes you wonder how nobody noticed that their little elixir of youth never worked."

Hala laughed as if he'd just told a hilarious joke, "Worry not, this actually does work." He didn't seem to notice Guzma rolling his eyes, "It's a tradition that's almost been forgotten, but I just remembered it only a few days ago. It's become almost a legend by now, but there are several records of it being undertaken over the past five hundred years."

Five hundred years? Well, now he could relax. Guzma bit back a snarky response as he watched Hala shift comfortably in his throne-like chair. He _did_ want to become a better person. Years of yelling at people, breaking things and generally not being a very nice person didn't really make him feel all that good in the long run. On the other hand, he wasn't ready to start acting like some sort of hippie with 'healing rituals' or freaking 'cleansing rocks' or whatever the hell Hala was going to try and talk him into next.

"It's actually called the Trials of Rebirth." Hala added, not helping Guzma's train of thought at all.

"You need to think up a better name for that." Guzma couldn't help but tell him, "I can see why it's become nothin' but a legend. Nobody would want to have anything to do with a name like that." To be fair, he could hardly think up anything better. His mother had gone through a brief hippie phase in his childhood; dream catchers and all. She'd spent almost a year going on about positive and negative energies and whatnot. It had not been a pleasant time.

"If you want to give it a different name, be my guest." Hala told him, "But I highly recommend you take this journey, it would be a fulfilling experience for you."

It took all of Guzma's self-control to not roll his eyes again. The 'Trials of Rebirth' sounded more like the name of a kung fu movie than a legitimate ritual. He was just opening his mouth to give a sour remark in response to Hala's idea of a 'fulfilling experience' when something hit him. "Hang on, you said 'you', not 'us'. Twice. That wasn't a mistake. You tryin' to get rid of me already?"

"Actually, the Trials of Rebirth-"

"Please stop calling it that."

"- has several requirements for the participants."

"Oh really now?"

"Yes, really now." If Hala had picked up on the blatant sarcasm in Guzma's voice, he didn't say anything, "You might not like it, but this ancient ritual has some rather strict rules that must be followed. And the very first rule is that the Trials of Rebirth must be undertaken by exactly four individuals, and all must be taking the challenge in order to redeem themselves."

Guzma frowned, not entirely convinced by his old master's words. It all sounded a little too perfect; a redemption trial for him that Hala apparently wasn't allowed to take part in. "This is a real thing, right? You're not just making this up so you don't have to go with me, yeah?"

"Now why would I do that?" Hala sounded genuinely surprised at that.

"Because the only reason why anybody would wanna spend time with me is if they're forced to as part of some 'ancient quest ritual thing' shit." His gaze flickered to the floor and he felt his nails digging into his palms as he clenched his fists. The old man had better not have given up on him already; not when he'd just made up his mind to turn his life around.

"Guzma." Hala's voice suddenly took on a softer tone and Guzma forced himself to look the old kahuna in the face. "Don't swear."

Guzma scowled, "Seriously?"

"And don't put yourself down like that."

"I do what I want." Guzma snapped. He was about to add something about being the big bad boss of Team Skull when he remembered he didn't even have _that_ anymore.

"Does that mean you'll agree to do the Trials of Rebirth?" Damn, that man was eager to get him out the door. Either he was absolutely certain that the thing would work or he'd already run out of options. Guzma had a feeling that nowhere would accept him for community service and Hala seemed to be against sending him to prison.

All he could really say was that the last thing he wanted was to wind up in jail. Again. Maybe these stupid trials could actually help him in some way. Guzma sighed, he was really going to give the hippie bogus a go. What was wrong with him?

"Okay old man, tell me more."

* * *

Guzma was in a bad mood.

Of course, that wasn't saying much. Plumeria was used to seeing her little brother in varying degrees of grumpy. Her time acquainted with him had taught her about anger in all shapes and forms. Irritation, frustration, full-on blind rage, annoyance…

"I should have never asked him about it, who did I think I was?" He was only partially talking to Plumeria. She had seated herself on her bed, computer on her lap as she surfed the internet with one hand and scratched her crobat under her chin with her other hand, pretending to be only slightly paying attention to him. "I ain't some freak who believes some kinda magic is gonna solve all my problems. I'm Guzma! I solve my problems myself!"

Plumeria was tempted to add 'Really? And how has that been working out for you?' but decided against it. Guzma was (sort of) trying his best to change his ways. Unfortunately, old habits die hard. He'd been an angry, merciless gang leader for years; there were plenty of things about him that weren't going to go away anytime soon. His stubbornness and bad attitude where only two of such things that Plumeria could list off the top of her head.

"And Hala expects me to find three other freaks like me who'll actually agree to go on this freaking road trip with me. Who the hell would want to stay near me for that long?" He looked as if he wanted to throw something, but Plumeria knew that he wouldn't dare. The moment they'd rented the apartment that they now shared, she'd made something abundantly clear: If he lost his temper and got them kicked out, she would personally set her salazzle on him. And he knew from experience that she was a woman who kept her word.

"There are plenty of people who used to work in Team Skull who'd be happy to hang out with you." Plumeria pointed out without looking up from her laptop screen. It wasn't because she was trying to be inconsiderate, but she'd just found a really well written zombie AU fanfiction with lots of guts and gore to top it off.

She heard Guzma snort, "Yeah right, as if. They're all scared of me, none would wanna come along. And even if they did, it'll be because they'd feel like I forced them." He sighed and flopped down onto his own bed, "The last thing I wanna do is get Hala to choose. He'll probably go to some high security prison and find the worst criminals there to come with. Then he'll go 'Here, these guys need some redeeming, too! Try not to let them MURDER YOU IN YOUR SLEEP!' And I ain't lettin' _that_ happen."

Plumeria rolled her eyes; Guzma really did tend to get rather dramatic at times. "How about I find you a grunt who wants redemption, isn't completely scared of you so they won't feel pressured into going, and won't try and kill you in your sleep? I think I know a few."

"Seriously?"

"We can even hold interviews if you want."

"No, don't do that for the love of-" he broke off and she saw him frown out of the corner of her eye, "You're not really gonna do that, are you?"

"What do _you_ think?"

"Very funny, Plumes."

"So are you really going to do this?"

There was a pause as Guzma thought over her question, "I guess. Maybe. Hala probably wants me to but I dunno. I mean, I get that he's trying to help me out and all, but I really don't see what some ancient trial is gonna do. It's not gonna make me a good person and have everybody like me all of a sudden."

"It might look really good on your résumé." Plumeria said, half sarcastic. Of course, she knew that he would never put 'Finished the Trials of Rebirth' on his résumé, but a little rewording could work miracles.

"Ya think?" He groaned and rolled over, "But ok, yeah, I guess it won't hurt to give this a go. I mean, it sounds like bogus to me but if it makes the old man happy, I might as well. I'll just need to find some gullible idiots to come along with me and I'll be all set."

Plumeria nodded, a rather sick sense of excitement welling up inside her as one of the main characters in her zombie fanfiction was horribly killed off, "I know somebody who wouldn't say no to a redemption quest." She said, "I can guarantee that she'll be happy to come along. Then we'll just need to find one more and we'll be able to get this entire thing over and done with."

"Plumes, we need four people, not three. Weren't you-" Guzma broke off and a note of surprise was added to his voice, "Hang on – we?" He propped himself up on his elbows and stared at her, "Plumes, you really don't need to come."

Plumeria looked up from her laptop (rather reluctantly too; this was a splendidly written death scene) and returned his gaze, "I was your admin, I need to do some redeeming for myself. Plus, it sounds like fun."

His expression turned to a frown, "You're not doing this just because you feel sorry for me, right?" He demanded, "You actually want to go? You wanna hop across Alola, stuck with me and two other weirdos as we fill in some sorta ancient checklist to prove ourselves worthy of forgiveness or whatever?"

"Yes."

Guzma looked genuinely touched and Plumeria fought the urge to lean over and punch the idiot lightly on the shoulder. Did he really think she'd abandon one of her dumb brothers when he needed her? She voiced this thought aloud and Guzma threw his pillow at her, muttering about him not being ' _that_ stupid' before promptly falling out of his bed only seconds later.

Plumeria ignored his curses as she turned back to her laptop. Within moments, she was fully immersed in the horrific post-apocalyptic story she had before her. Although she was still uncertain what the future held in store for them, she knew that a change of scenery would do Guzma some good. There were bound to be plenty of powerful trainers they could challenge and wipe the floor with and heaps of perfectly legal things to do like… Well, she would make a list later when her full attention wasn't on the main characters escaping from hordes of ravenous zombies. As long as nothing too unexpected happened, they should be fine.

Little did she know, the unexpected was just around the corner.

* * *

 **AN: … And that's the into. Please do tell me what you think, what you expect is going to happen, what you had for breakfast…**

 **And in case any of you may have been wondering: this is a sort of crossover with PMD: Explorers. If you haven't played those games, don't worry! You don't really have to in order to understand what's going on.**

 **So, you've got Grumpy Boy Guzma, Protective Big Sis Plumeria, an annoying OC and a skuntank all going on a road trip together. This is going to be fun…**


	2. Bad Luck and Tumbling Skunks

_Bad Luck and Tumbling Skunks_

Nessa grinned at her reflection in the mirror. The pink dye was beginning to wash out of her hair, her makeup was on point, she'd gotten a good night sleep for the first time in weeks and best of all; she'd managed to keep a job for three whole days.

Three days! 72 hours! That was more than two days! She couldn't believe it. The only job she'd been able to keep since she was cursed was in Team Skull, but that was mostly due to the incredibly low standards the gang had. But all the same, three days! This remarkable turn of events was due to caution, hard work and for the first time in what felt like forever: good luck.

She turned away from the mirror, unable to wipe the grin off her face even as she tripped down the staircase and stepped into the pouring rain of Po town.

Today she was going to start her fourth day of work and nothing was going to stop her. No bad weather, no bad boss, no bad curse. Everything was going to be perfect.

* * *

She returned back to Po town four hours later, head hung and shoes dragging in the mud. The rain fell from the sky like her tears. Well, not really. She wasn't upset enough to be _crying_. She was just upset. And a little frustrated that she had been surprised by that day's events; she should have known better than think that something wouldn't go wrong. But the rain was beautifully poetic nonetheless.

For a minute, Nessa considered dramatically standing in the downpour and contemplating her entire life choices as she'd once seen in a movie. But four seconds of being pelted with the icy droplets and being battered by the no less chilling wind, she opted to go inside instead.

She was shivering when she stepped inside the mansion, pinkish hair plastered to her scalp and clothing completely soaked through. Her shoes made that annoying _eek eek_ sound as she walked and she had to stop in order to wring them out. Her socks, too. In fact, everything was as soaked as a sponge. A sponge filled with bad luck and despair.

She frowned to herself and made a mental note to think up a better analogy later. She peeled off her coat and hung it on a hook by the front door. The hook instantly came off the wall and her coat hit the floor with a _splat_. She sighed and draped it over a nearby chair to dry before trudging up the cluttered staircase to her room.

After the disbandment of Team Skull three weeks ago, most of the grunts had gone their separate ways and searched for jobs and housing that did not consist of abandoned mouldy buildings. Those who either had no relatives in Alola or couldn't afford to stay anywhere remained in said abandoned mouldy buildings. But it really wasn't so bad. There were plenty of other ex-grunts who kept each other company and every now and again, Plumeria would come around to visit them. Sometimes, she brought cookies.

Plenty of her old co-workers and completely turned their lives around. A man who previously spent all his time shoplifting TMs to sell for ridiculous prices was working for the reformed Aether Foundation. A woman who used to (pathetically attempt to) mug people behind the Pokémon Centre was now working in one. And meanwhile, Nessa was still stuck in the same place she'd been for years: unemployed and cursed.

The doorhandle to her room broke off as she tried to turn it and she huffed a sigh, tossing it into the piles of junk that clogged up the halls of the once beautiful mansion. It had been almost five years since this curse had been placed on her and it had stopped being funny long ago. But it appeared that her breaking and walking into things never stopped being amusing for the people around her.

Almost as soon as she'd closed the door, she heard somebody knock on it. With a frown, she opened it to reveal Plumeria standing before her. Immediately, her mood brightened.

"Big sis!" She swung the door open and took a step back, almost tripping over more junk piles that somebody had thought was a good idea to store in her room. "How did you get here so quickly?"

"I was right behind you the entire time." Plumeria responded.

"Oh, I didn't hear you."

"Really? I was calling your name and everything."

"Ah." Maybe she'd been too busy wallowing in self-pity to hear. Oh well. "What are you doing here? Did you bring cookies?"

Plumeria tried to hide her smile as she handed Nessa a paper bag which she took eagerly, "How are you doing? I heard you got a job at one of those clothes stores."

Nessa shrugged one shoulder as she crammed an entire cookie into her mouth; she hadn't noticed how hungry she was, "I got fired just then." She mumbled around it, "I almost set fire to the shop. Some kind of problem with electrical equipment. It wasn't even plugged in." Stupid curse bending the laws of physics…

Plumeria nodded. What Nessa loved about her was that even if she didn't understand what you were on about, she was great at pretending that she did. It made everybody feel so much better about themselves. "How long have you had that curse of yours now?"

"Five years." Nessa told her, eating another cookie. They were store-bought but tasty nonetheless, "Since Team Flare got destroyed." She could remember the event as if it were just yesterday. The earth quaking like a, well, _earthquake_. The air filled with dust. The panicked shouts of the other grunts as they trampled over one another to get to the exit. Dragging herself out of the rubble of Gosenge town, her suit shredded and flecked with blood.

Those were not fun times. And things got a lot less fun since then. Bad luck and a sudden tendency to break things caused a chain of unfortunate events that ended with her getting shipped off to a prison in Alola where she accidentally escaped and ended up joining yet another gang. But at least this one had a cool big sister figure who brought them cookies.

Plumeria's voice broke Nessa out of her thoughts, "Have you heard of the Trials of Rebirth?"

Nessa frowned and shook her head, her mouth too full to reply. Whatever it was, it sounded needlessly dramatic. Like some kind of video game quest or something.

"Me neither. But long story short: Hala wants Guzma to take part in it and to do so, he needs three others who need redeeming. I was wondering if you'd mind coming along. It shouldn't be too difficult or take too long, so you can go back to job hunting before you know it."

"You're forgetting something." Nessa said, chewing on another cookie, "I'm not a very lucky person. And if you bring me along, we're not going to be a very lucky group."

Plumeria nodded, "That is true." She conceded, "But who knows? We might find some way to break that curse of yours."

Nessa snorted, accidentally inhaling cookie crumbs before having to spend the next minute hacking them up, "What are the odds of _that_ happening?" She gasped, blinking tears from her eyes.

Plumeria shrugged, "I don't know, but it won't hurt to give it a try."

Nessa considered this. She hadn't let a very good life so far, hopping from Team to Team. Of course, she hadn't been fully aware that Team Flare was planning on wiping out everybody in the world (but honestly, could you blame her? None of the other grunts ever acted like _they_ knew) but she nonetheless took part in working toward their cause. And no matter how poorly she'd worked in Team Skull, she'd helped steal and scam other people for years. By the looks of it, she was in some desperate need of redeeming. Maybe _that_ could help break her curse somehow. And even if it didn't, it might be fun. It had been a long time since she'd gone on her pokemon journey as a kid and she'd been sorely missing the open road.

But there one more pressing matter to address first.

"Can I finish these or do you want me to share them with the others?" She questioned, holding up the bag of cookies.

"You can keep them, I brought more." Plumeria responded, "So is that a yes?"

"Heck yeah." Nessa nodded eagerly before turning her full attention to the cookies.

* * *

Kurou hit the ground rolling.

And rolling.

And rolling.

And rolling.

The world was a blur. Stones dug into him and he could feel the breath being knocked out of him when he finally slammed to a halt with his face in the dirt. He gasped for breath and instead found himself breathing in dust and flailing around as he struggled to breathe properly and fight down the wave of nausea that swept over him.

In short: it was not what he'd call fun.

He tried to stand and the world tipped to one side. No wait, he'd simply fallen back down. That explained why he was still lying face-down in the dust. Everything was so blurry.

Heh, blurry. That word sounded weird. Blurry blurry blurry blurry blurry…

What was he doing?

He couldn't think clearly; he must have hit his head on the way down.

Was he saying that right? Head? Heed? Hade? Hed? Hod? Was it even a real word? The more he thought about it, the less it sounded like one.

Something felt wrong. He tried to think what it could be but all he could think of was whether or not he'd been lied to his whole life over the existence of the word 'head'. Was there something wrong? Asides from the fact that he felt as if the thing that he thought was his head had been repetitively bashed with a rock and then filled with cotton. He frowned to himself. That hadn't happened, had it? What _had_ happened? He was… He had been… Head head head head….

"Hey, are you okay?" He jumped and fell back down as a bluish blackish whitish figure appeared in his vision. Kurou squinted at the shape but his eyes just wouldn't adjust. Or maybe it was a living, breathing, talking blur. Kurou had never met a talking blur before. This was going to be an experience he would tell his grandchildren.

"Yo, are you alright?" Another blurry shape appeared, followed by a third. So many blurry shapes. His grandchildren were not going to believe him when he would tell them this.

Yo? Now was _that_ even a word? … No, it sounded right to him. Yo was definitely a word. He wasn't sure about head, but at least he was certain about yo. Thank Arceus.

Ar-see-us? Ar-kee-us? Ar-kay-us? Everyone seemed to pronounce it differently. How did he pronounce it? Who was Arceus? What was life? What was time? He felt like curling into a ball on the ground and rocking back and forth, back and forth, back and-

Wait no, he was actually doing it. Ah, everything hurt. Head, back, arms… Arms? Oh, he had arms. He couldn't remember ever having arms. Did he? Was _that_ even a real word? Maybe he meant army. He had a feeling that he never had one of those, either. He had a lot of legs though. Or at least, he once had a lot. Now he appeared to only have two. How strange.

But something else was bothering him. Something he couldn't quite put his paw on. Something- Someone- Some people- Was he meant to be alone? He could have sworn that he wasn't before he'd gone tumbling down that hill. He struggled to organise his misty thoughts, but all he could think of was whether or not 'head' was a word. Because it really wasn't. It sounded too dumb to be a real word. Hed. I hit my hed. Heeeeeeed…

"You think he's drunk?"

"Nah, maybe he just hit his head."

What had he just said? The speaker had been making up words, Kurou had just established that 'head' wasn't a real word. He tried to say that but a slurred jumble of half-formed words came out instead.

There was a pause. The blurs must have been contemplating his words. In Kurou's opinion, he'd raised a rather valid point despite not knowing what the heck he'd just said.

"Should we take him to the hospital?"

"He's really starting to scare me, yo."

"I think I should go get my grandfather."

"Watsagrendfether?"

"Andy, Baki, stay with him and make sure he doesn't do anything too weird. I'll be back."

"Wait no! Don't leave us alone with the crazy guy!"

"Too late, he's gone."

"You don't think he's dangerous, do you?"

"Armnetdengerisyurdengeris."

"I- He seems ok I guess."

Now the blurs were talking about him as if he wasn't sitting right in front of them. How rude. But he couldn't blame them, maybe it was a cultural thing. Maybe all blurs did things like this. If he was now living in their world, he'd have to learn the ways of their people. Blur people. Bleeple.

There was a pause and shuffling sound. Finally, one of the blurs spoke.

"So um, what's up?"

"Neh." Kurou was tired. He didn't feel like talking to the blurs, even if he knew he was never going to meet another one again. Before he knew it, he was curled up on the ground. Maybe if he pretended he was asleep, they'd leave him alone.

"Try and stay awake, yo. Um, he should, right? That's what they say in movies when somebody's dying."

"He's not dying, is he?"

"No, he just looks sleepy. But he might be dying."

"Nooooooooooo Imnatdying."

"He says he's not dying."

"He could be wrong, though."

"Hey, are you wrong?"

"Nooooooooooo."

"Oh, ok." There was another pause, "So who are you, anyway?"

Kurou groaned and buried his face in the dirt. There was a patch of grass a metre away from him that would have been a much nicer place to put his face, but he couldn't be bothered to move that far.

"Sorry bro, couldn't hear you. What did you say?"

"Imthebossoftemskul." Kurou mumbled, shuffling over to the patch of grass as the dirt soon proved to be very uncomfortable.

There was a third pause, even longer than before.

"Did… Did you just say Team Skull?"

Had he? Maybe he had. What was a skull? He was dimly aware that it might have something to do with heeds. Heds. Heads. Feds. Fed. He was hungry. He chewed on some of the grass and instantly spat it out. That wasn't good fed. Feed. Food.

"Yo, you got something to do with Team Skull? I've never seen you before."

"Imtheboss." Kurou groaned, rolling over so that his back was to the blurs. He needed sleep. The blurs needed to respect his personal space. He decided at that moment that their culture was a very rude one.

"You're the boss?" One of the blurs echoed. There was yet another pause. Blurs must be obsessed with those. Finally, the other blur spoke.

"I think Guzma might want to hear about this."


End file.
